


There's a Certain Degree of Responsibility in Absenteeism

by Draikinator



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime, Transformers: Robots in Disguise (2015)
Genre: Copious amounts of catharticism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 05:45:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3278951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draikinator/pseuds/Draikinator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shit sucks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's a Certain Degree of Responsibility in Absenteeism

Tired was not nearly a descriptive enough word to express how Bumblebee felt. Exhausted felt more accurate. Weary was probably the closest, but nothing was really precise enough to satisfy him. Nothing in English, anyway, which was a language he was trying very hard to stick to. The local species couldn’t speak Universal, and, unfortunately, neither could his Cybertronian teammates. All too young to have had a chance to pick up the language yet- way too many post-revival priorities for those still fresh from the Well.

He told himself that he liked the sound of his voice, and that never dipping into Universal’s familiar beeps and tones didn’t bother him at all.

Bee was scanning his old, still-saved Earth contact signals for the fifth time in as many days. They’d been on this planet for nearly a week now and he refused to admit the weight had fallen off his shoulders that first moment he felt grass under his pedes and refused to admit that for the few brief seconds before he found himself responsible for two veritable children he hadn’t felt so tired. Exhausted. Weary. Whatever.

The cell numbers he’d had logged were long since deactivated- no surprise there. Humans went through gadgets like Knock Out went through cans of clear coat. Two decades was enough that whatever they’d been using was probably ancient history by now. His military contacts had definitely expired, too- which he was somewhat more surprised by. Considering the humans knew Cybertronians were a long-lived species relative to theirs it was sort of weird to think that two decades was all it needed for them to give up and kill the line.

Raf had his personal comm frequency, though, and Bee refused to believe he’d lost it. Finding Raf would be a bit of a hassle- considering the radio frequencies themselves were different than they once had been, far more crowded and mostly military, and he wasn’t comfortable risking exposure with government agencies he didn’t know he could trust yet. While he knew Raf wouldn’t have any issues reaching his unit, it required Raf to contact him first, and he had no way of knowing Bee was on the planet, so that seemed unlikely.

A google search turned up little. He was surprised not to hear anything about Rafael- his friend was brilliant and obviously far beyond his species’ usual rate of skill development. He would have expected him to have gained some kind of trackable notoriety by now.

Searching his name turned up nothing but some articles from when Bee had known him- his name in the local paper over science fair projects, his name on the presumed dead list when Jasper had gone under.

Nothing after.

He kept his personal comm open, despite the questioning looks Strongarm gave him every time she passed by at night and the sidelong glances between Fixit and Sideswipe. He knew they were wondering who he was listening for and part of him wondered if they thought it was Optimus- a reasonable assumption he was quite comfortable letting them keep.

He ran another search, this time for Pilar Esquivel, and was surprised by the results. An adult now, she was a high school teacher in Sparks. He thought that was ironic.

Her contact info was on the school’s website.

Bumblebee closed the page and stood up, returning to the group, watching one of the Earth programs Russel was showing them. A rerun of something old-he’d already seen this one. With Raf.

He turned almost immediately, ignoring Sideswipe asking if he was okay and Russel’s disappointed look, heading back to the labyrinthian maze of the junkyard to pace.

He reopened the tab, thumbing through the school’s directory. Her number was sitting there. Waiting. Active.

Another moment of gladness for Raf’s tinkering and his comm unit’s compatibility with earth cell phones and, after only another moment of hesitation, he dialed.

It was only after she answered, voice softer than he would have expected, with a tired “Hello?” That he realized he didn’t have a cover story.

"Oh! Uh-" he started, fumbling, "Hi."

"May I ask who is speaking, please?" She said, politely.

"Um- my name is… Russel," he said, lamely, "I… I used to live in Jasper, and I was just wondering, did you- maybe. I’m looking for Raf?"

Dead silence.

"I’m sorry," she said, her voice shaking, and the line clicked off.

Bee froze in his pacing, confused, before he dialed back. The first time it rang once before hanging up, the second time he got a busy signal, and by the the third it was straight to voicemail. He only left one. “Please.”

After an hour, he closed the browser, and turned off his comm.


End file.
